by Carter, Ally
“Will I just see you around, then? You know, for self-defense tips and stuff?”
“I . . .” I stumbled, knowing I’d finally made it to the edge of the cliff, and I had to decide if it was worth the fall.
I attend the best school in the country. I can speak fourteen languages, but I can’t talk to this boy? What good is a genius IQ? Why bother teaching us the things we know? What’s the use in . . .
And then I saw it.
I turned to Josh. “Do you like spy movies?”
He looked at me, then muttered, “Um . . . sure.”
“Well . . .” I inched closer to the gazebo, which was very Americana. Very Sound of Music. Very Gilmore Girls. But the really important thing about the Roseville gazebo wasn’t that it had awesome twinkle lights. No, it was better—it was the loose stone jutting out from its base.
(FYI, for the most part, spies love loose stones.)
“I saw this movie,” I said, pacing myself. “It was an old movie . . . in black-and-white . . . and this girl wanted to communicate with this boy, but they couldn’t, because it was too dangerous.”
“Why? Because he was a spy?”
He? Sometimes the sexism in this country amazes me, but then I remembered that society’s tendency to underestimate women is a Gallagher Girl’s greatest weapon, and I consoled myself by remembering how it had taken less than two seconds for me to level Josh flat and hard onto the pavement.
“Yes,” I said. “He was a spy.”
“Cool.” He nodded.
“You can leave me notes in there.” I removed the stone, revealing the small hole in the mortar. “And just replace the stone backward, so I’ll know there’s a note.” I slid the stone in so that the painted face was on the inside. The effect was of one gray piece of slate in a snow-colored field. “And when I leave a note, I’ll turn it around the other way. See?” I said, feeling perhaps a little too proud of myself. “We used to do this all the time . . . in Mongolia.”
Doesn’t she know there’s such a thing as e-mail? I imagined him wondering. Instant Messenger? Cell phones? Even tin cans tied together with string probably seemed high-tech compared to what I was proposing. He either thought I was crazy or from some really bizarre experiment where they freeze people for decades, even though I know for a fact that technology isn’t to a prototype phase yet.
He looked at me like I was crazy, so I said, “You’re right. It’s stupid.” I turned. “I’ve got to go. It was . . .”
“Cammie.” The word stopped me. “You’re not a normal girl, are you?”
Okay, so maybe Josh was pretty smart, too.
Summary of Communication
On October 18, during a routine Driver’s Ed assignment, The Operatives noticed that the “fill sign” was marked (in other words, the stone was turned) at the designated dead letter drop, so Agent Morgan faked a stomachache when everyone else was engaged in a Gilmore Girls marathon and went to retrieve the following:
Okay, so if your dad’s not Aquaman, is he The Flash?
Translation: Please think I’m funny, because my self-esteem is fairly low, and humor may be all I have going for me. (Translation done by Macey McHenry.)
After a brief reply from The Operative, The Subject wrote back the following week:
Today my shop teacher gave me detention for not properly sanding a birdhouse. Then my dad told me I should start helping him at the pharmacy two nights a week. When I got home, I found out that my mom made 18 different kinds of banana bread, and I had to taste-test each one. It was torture. How was your day?
Translation: I feel very comfortable sharing things with you because you are separate from my ordinary, mundane life. Leaving these notes and having clandestine meetings is exciting. Having a relationship with you is new and unique, and I’m enjoying it. (Translation done by Macey McHenry, with assistance from Elizabeth Sutton.)
The Operatives took this message as a positive sign and fully expected The Subject to continue communication. A level of trust seemed to be building, and The Operatives felt as if The Subject may soon be ready to be called on to act. The Subject was making excellent progress.
Then they received the following:
This is crazy. You know that, right?
Translation: While I enjoy the temporary release from normalcy this relationship provides, I can see that it is impractical in the long run. However, I am willing to see where it goes. (Translation done by Macey McHenry.)
Following this communication, The Operatives knew that it was important to proceed slowly in order to bring The Subject along at a manageable pace. They agreed that any mention of dates, making out, and any sort of formal events should be postponed indefinitely.
Another week passed before The Operatives received their most significant piece of communication to date:
Is there any chance you can come to the movies this Friday? I know you may not be able to, but I’ll be here (at our place) at seven if you can.
Translation: WE’RE IN!! (Translation done by Cameron Morgan and verified by Macey McHenry.)
We had a place! We had a date—to the movies!
My euphoria lasted from the time I picked up the note and all the way through our customary debrief up in the suite. By the next morning, however, I wasn’t thinking like a girl—I was thinking like a spy.
What if movies were the favorite pastime of the guys in the Gallagher Maintenance Department? Or, what if the movie was gross and I got nauseous and puked Milk Duds everywhere?
MILK DUDS! What if I got caramel in my teeth and had to go digging around in a molar or something to get it out? There is simply no attractive way of doing that! What was I going to do—only eat popcorn? But then the same thing could happen with the little kernel pieces!
Oh my gosh! I had an Organic Chemistry test and a Conversational Swahili exam, but both of those things seemed like child’s play compared to the dilemma at hand— right up until Macey joined us at our lunch table and said, “Junior Mints.”
Junior Mints—of course! Minty chocolate fun with none of the dangerous side effects. I take back everything I ever said about her ever in my life. MACEY McHENRY IS A GENIUS!
Liz was looking at the note, comparing it against the others she’d already run through the lab to see if the chemical composition of the paper or the ink could tell us anything. (It did—he shops at Wal-Mart.)
“Notice how he tilts the M in movie,” Liz said, holding the note toward us. “I think I remember reading that this shows a tendency to . . .”
But a tendency to what, we’d never find out, because just then the sophomore lunch tables went quiet in a way that could only mean one thing.
“Hello, ladies,” Joe Solomon said, but not before I snatched the piece of paper and crammed it in my mouth, which ordinarily would have been really great spy maneuvering except that Josh doesn’t use Evapopaper.
“How’s the lasagna?” Mr. Solomon asked, and I started to say something before I remembered that my mouth was . . . well . . . otherwise engaged.
“The Gallagher Academy career fair is this Friday evening,” Mr. Solomon said. My roommates and I all looked at each other—the exact same thing crossing our minds— this Friday evening! “Here’s a list of agencies and firms that will be represented.” He tossed a stack of flyers onto the long table. “Great chance to see what’s out there—especially for those of you who won’t be joining me in Sublevel Two.”
Okay, I admit it. That part made me swallow a little paper.
After Mr. Solomon left, I spat out what was left of Josh’s note (which luckily included all of the writing) and stared at it and the shiny flyer, which announced a chance for me to chart the course of the rest of my life. I wasn’t hungry anymore.
Career day at spy school is probably like career days at regular schools except . . . well . . . we probably have a lot more guests who arrive by rappeling out of black helicopters. (The guys from Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms have always been kinda show-offy.)
The hallways were full of folding tables and cheesy banners. (GO ALL THE WAY WITH THE NSA—who thinks of this stuff?) Every classroom had a scout perched at a back table, watching in amazement as we went through our routines. Even P&E was crawling with spies—literally—as we spread out in the barn and showed off our overall lethal-ness for the recruiters.
“Don’t take my head off!” Liz cried.
I wasn’t sure if she was talking about the roundhouse kick that had just passed inches from her nose or the fact that Bex was refusing to consider postponing my big date. In any case, I was fairly certain we probably shouldn’t be having that conversation in a hayloft full of current and future government agents.
Light cascaded through the skylights. Barn swallows nested in the rafters up above. And ten feet away, Tina Walters was showing an agent from the FBI how we’d learned to kill a man with a piece of uncooked spaghetti.
“Guys!” I snapped.
A whistle blew, telling us it was time to shift positions, so Bex came to stand behind me. As she wrapped her arms around my neck, she whispered in my ear, “Crowded corridors. Tons of people. No one will miss you—not The Chameleon.”
I flipped her over my back and glared at her as she lay sprawled on the mat beneath me.
“I think you have to cancel,” Liz said as she charged at me. I slid aside and dropped her neatly to the mat next to Bex. She pushed up on her elbows and whispered, “This is an opportunity for the Gallagher Girls of today to decide how they will become the Gallagher Women of tomorrow.” (Or so we’d read on the flyer.)
I was just starting to feel in control of the situation, when Bex’s leg swung swiftly around, catching me off guard, dropping me to the top of the pile. “Yeah, like Cammie doesn’t know what she’s going to be when she grows up.”
Before I could reply, we saw a man walking toward us, so we scrambled to our feet. He wasn’t tall or short; he wasn’t handsome or ugly. He was the kind of person you could see a dozen times and never quite remember, and with just one glance I knew he was a pavement artist—I knew he was like me.
“Very nice,” the man said. There was no telling how long he’d been in that crowded loft, watching. “You girls are sophomores, is that right?”
There was an extra bounce in Bex’s step as she inched toward him. “Yes, sir,” she said, her voice full of swagger.
“And you’re all studying Covert Operations?” he asked with a sideways glance at Liz, who had somehow gotten her hair tangled in the laces of my shoe.
“Just for this semester,” Liz said, sounding totally relieved.
“Next semester we can specialize if we want to,” Bex clarified. “But a lot of us continue training for fieldwork.”
I’m pretty sure she was getting ready to slip into the conversation how she got to be lookout for her dad once while he took out an arms dealer at an outdoor market in Cairo, but the man didn’t give her a chance.
“Well,” he said. “I’ll let you get back to your practice.” He placed his hands in his pockets and smiled. When he turned to walk away, I didn’t think he’d seen me at all, until he glanced in my direction and nodded. “Ms. Morgan.” If he’d had a hat he would have tipped it.
On the other side of the room, Ms. Hancock blew her whistle again and yelled, “Circle up, girls. Let’s show our guests how we play rock-paper-scissors.”
Bex winked at me and rolled up a copy of the October Vogue that she’d borrowed from Macey.
I felt sorry for whoever drew rock and scissors.
Operation Divide and Conquer
The operation, which took place on Friday night, October 29, was a basic four-man op with three agents holding in secure sweeping patterns throughout the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women. The Reserve Operatives were assigned a portion of the main campus, and when asked where Agent Morgan was, The Operatives were to reply “I don’t know” or “I just saw her heading that way” while pointing in a very general direction.
If asked more directly about the location of Agent Morgan, The Operatives were to exclaim, “You just missed her!” and then walk very quickly away.
I followed Bex and Macey through the corridors. Sounds bounced off the hardwood floors and stone walls as newbies drooled over the Mr. Solomon-like recruiters from the CIA, and a flock of seventh graders oohed and aahed over the latest satellite feeds from Homeland Security. (So that’s what Brad Pitt’s bedroom looks like. . . .)
Bex was totally right. I’ve seen the Gallagher Academy in states of organized chaos before, but never have I seen it so alive. The air was full of something (and not just the gases that had escaped from the labs when someone from Interpol got a little too close to one of Dr. Fibs’s classified projects).
“Okay,” Bex said to me beneath her breath. “Knock ’em dead.”
I glanced at Macey. “You’ll be fine,” she said, and I started to feel really good. Then she finished. “Just don’t be an idiot.”
I turned down an empty corridor, leaving the sounds of our future behind me, and sensed something else drawing closer. I reached out for the tapestry and the crest-slash-trigger behind it, when I stopped frozen at the sound of my name.
“You must be Cameron Morgan.”
The man strolling toward me had a dark suit, dark hair, and eyes so black they could get completely lost in the night.
“And where are you running off to?” the man asked.
“Oh, they needed more napkins at the refreshments table.” (Whether you agree or disagree with my actions, you’ve got to admit that my fibbing ability was totally getting better.)
He laughed. “Oh, child, don’t you know that anyone with your pedigree should never have to fetch the napkins?” I stared blankly at him, unable to smile, until he extended his hand. “I’m Max Edwards. I knew your father.”
Of course he did. I’d met a half dozen men like Max Edwards already that day—men with stories, men with secrets—all wanting to pull me aside and return a little piece of my father to me. Even without Josh waiting for me at the end of the tunnel, I think I might have felt like running the other way.
“I’m with Interpol now.” Max Edwards said, eyeing me. “I know you’re a CIA legacy and all, but that’s no reason not to give the rest of us a shot, eh?”
“No, sir.”
“Started the CoveOps training yet?”
“Yes, sir, with the intro class.”
“Good. Good. I’m sure Joe Solomon is finding plenty to teach you,” he said, patting me on the shoulder, emphasizing the word in a way I didn’t understand. Then he leaned closer and whispered, “I’m going to give you some advice, Cammie. Not everyone can live this life, you know. Not everyone has it in their blood—the stress, the risk, the sacrifice.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a business card with a phone number centered and alone on the plain white background. “Call me anytime. You’ll always have a place with us.”
He patted me on the shoulder again and walked away, his footsteps echoing down the empty stone corridor. I watched him turn the corner; then I counted to ten and slipped behind the tapestry. Halfway down the tunnel, I stopped and changed my clothes. I never saw that card again.
I know in spy movies it always looks really cool when the operative goes from a maid’s uniform to a slinky, sexy ballgown in the amount of time it takes an elevator to climb three floors. Well, I don’t know how it is for TV spies, but I can tell you that even with Velcro, the art of the quick change is one that must take a lot of practice (not to mention better lighting than one is likely to find in a tunnel that was once a part of the Underground Railroad).
That’s probably why I panicked when I saw the strange look on Josh’s face when he first saw me outside the gazebo. Either my blouse was open, or my skirt was stuck in my underwear, or something even more mortifying. I froze.
“You look . . .”
I have lipstick on my teeth. My hair is full of cobwebs. I’m wearing two different kinds of shoes and my backup is two whole miles awa
y!
“. . . amazing.”
I’d never felt less invisible in my life. I forgot about Bex and Macey and their great bodies, Liz and her gorgeous blond hair. Even my mother faded from my mind as I saw myself through Josh’s eyes. For the first time in a long time I didn’t want to disappear.
Then I remembered that it was my turn to say something. He was wearing a leather jacket and khaki pants that had the kind of crisp creases that made me think of the Navy SEALs, who were probably doing a demonstration in the Gallagher Academy pond at that very moment, so I said, “You look very . . . clean.”
“Yeah.” He tugged at his collar. “My mom found out and . . . well . . . let’s just say you were this close to having to wear a wrist corsage.” He held two fingers inches apart, and I remembered one time when my dad got my mom a corsage— of course it came equipped with a retinal scanner and comms unit, but still, the thought was nice.
I started to say so, but just then Josh said, “I’m sorry, but we kind of missed the movie. I should have looked up the times before I asked you. It started at six.”
The mission was compromised at 19:00 hours when The Operative and The Subject realized they had missed their window of opportunity—which in The Operative’s opinion was a waste of her best outfit.
“Oh,” I said, trying not to sound too heartbroken. I’d let Liz do my hair. I’d jogged two miles in the dark. I had been looking forward to this all week, but all I could do was put on my best spy face and say, “That’s okay. I guess I’ll just . . .”
“Do you want to grab a burger?” Josh blurted before I could finish my thought.
Grab a burger? I’d just eaten filet mignon with the Deputy Director of the CIA, but I found myself saying, “I’d love to!”
Across the square, bright lights beamed through one set of windows. We walked toward the light, and Josh held the door open for me and gestured for me to walk in (how sweet is that!). The diner had a black-and-white checkerboard floor with red vinyl booths and lots of old records and pictures of Elvis nailed to the walls. The whole place was a little too doo-woppy for my personal taste, but that didn’t stop me from crawling into a booth—unfortunately on the side facing away from the windows since Josh had already nabbed the best position for himself. (Mr. Smith would have been very disappointed in me.) But at least across the booth he probably couldn’t feel my leg shaking.